The Game of Life
by The Little Mamaluke
Summary: Insanity reigns in a Scrabble game. Digimon Frontier storyline, total AU and OOCness. R&R, or


A/N: The following is a silly short tale on the heroes of Digimon Frontier. The Little Mamaluke is momentarily taking a break from Digimon Tamers and Jackie Chan Adventures because Frontier is all I'm able to see for several weeks on end. I've read plenty of the Frontier stories and they rock the digi-scene. Time for me to rock it as well, I hope.

This is AU. This happens, oh, about 7 or so years after the original tale.

Discl.- Frontier not mine. Frontier from Toei and Disney. Frontier better be on auction in future. This show can't just last only one year….

The Game of Life

"Z-O-E!" And just like that, the blithe Italian teenager of the Frontier Fleet had implanted three more of her Scrabble blocks into the crossword placard. "How about that, boys? Now I'm three blocks ahead to the finish line! Heh heh!"

"What?!" Junpei stared at the board, as did his buddies Kouji and Takuya, all of whom were nervously juggling their letter blocks over their sweating palms, wide eyes set at the imminent doom. "Aye," Junpei narrowed his eyebrows and sweatdropped, "You can't put Zoe in Scrabble! That's not even a real word!"

Izumi laughed at her burly buddy before raising up a thick red book from a stack of library books she had come prepared for that Saturday night. "It is if I can find 'Zoe' right here, in 'The Oxford Dictionary of Names'. If it's not in a dictionary, it doesn't exist!"

"She's too good," Takuya humbly said, scratching the cinnamon-brown hair concealed in his orange baseball cap.

"Well, isn't that why we're playing this game?" Kouji eyed his friend before assembling another word out of the collected blocks. "W-O-L-F-M-O-N! Wolfmon! Now I'm ahead of the pack, just like my digimon!"

"Now wait up!" Takuya exclaimed as he proceeded to crane away the last three letters from the recent word. Kouji gripped his hand fiercely against Takuya, who dropped his hand and explained. "Wolfmon!? Not to sound so insulting, but that's not a word found in ANY dictionary."

"Yeah, except that I still have Bokomon's dictionary on all the digimon creatures we have met. Like Zoe says, if it ain't in a dictionary, it doesn't exist!"

Takuya sighed a small fog cloud. "Then let's hope you don't use Batman or Superman anywhere in the near future. Junpei, I think you're up."

"What?! I haven't even taken my time to find any word? Um, let's see, where next, where next….J-P! JP! Alright, Takuya, you can move on now." Junpei sat on his chair, fully content.

"Nuh-uh!" Zoe proclaimed as she slapped down the board. "First of all, you've got to explain this JP you have here! You're not safe when Zoe's watching the board!"

"Um, right, JP…Stands for 'Jurassic Park'?"

Zoe shook her head.

" 'Jiffy Peanut Butter?'"

"That would've been JP & B."

"Junpei?"

"Junpei hasn't thought of any words. Takuya you're next!"

"NOOO! For years, I have been denied, but I will not deny myself!" Junpei growled loudly as he removed the two game pieces in furious reluctance.

"Oh come off it, Junpei," Kouji eyed the big boy. "The winner gets to have a date with Zoe, that's all there is to gain. And if Izumi wins, well, no break for any one of us. Not like Tomoki cares; he's still playing that damned Final Fantasy XXII, is he?"

"L-O-V-E! Love! Neat way of sharing the 'O' with 'Zoe', doncha think?" Takuya watched the girl with a wink and a hearty smile.

"Yeah. I like it," Zoe said with an amused palm on her cheek..

"Oh no, oh no!" Junpei watched all this unfolding. "I'm getting this twisted feeling on my gut! I'm being turned inside out!!!"

Koji massaged his eyes, knowing there was defeat. "Sure, we all do, Junpei, when the pizza delivery boy's being late again."

Ding-Dong!

"Speak of an angel!" Junpei exclaimed.

"Yeah, an angel with zits," Koji chuckled. "Tom, your butt's falling asleep. Can you just pause your PS3 and pay the pizza boy? Oh right, and leave the pizza on the living room table. This game's gonna end sooner than I hoped."

Tomoki hopped toward the door with the cash Takuya had given him. He was about to open the pizza delivery boy when the door got jammed by the latter's forceful hand. "Huh? What gives?"

"DON'T open the door. I don't want to see them again!"

"Come on, Mr. Free Delivery, my friends are just playing Scrabble. They're kinda done with Strip Poker."

"Thank goodness! You like, have no idea how many seizures I had when the fat boy was dancing around!"

"Not much fun, is it?"

"Um, I was like, really hoping the girl would strut her stuff, you know, but like, when it's 3 boys and 1 girl, those odds aren't like, good enough, you know!"

"Man, you're pretty smart! I'm feeling dazed myself from seeing Kouji dancing to N'Sync. So before they go crazy again…Can I have the pizza now?"

The delivery boy slid the box carefully through the narrow space he permitted between the door and the outside. Tommy grabbed the box and was about to slide in the 20 bucks as an exchange…

"Man, summers are getting hotter," Takuya said as he removed his red jacket off of him.

The door slammed like crazy as the pizza delivery car blindingly skidded out of the streets, the driver hollering, "AAHH! Now they're playing Strip Scrabble! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!"

A slow rustle of wind calmed the entrance as Tomoki stood there, still holding the piping hot box and the flimsy bill. "I didn't even give him his 20 bucks!…. Hmm. I'll just say he was late by 10 minutes. Free pizza rocks!" He took the box and began scarfing down the sumptuous bread, pepperoni and cheese.

"Hey, Tommy!" Junpei chided. "Can you try to remove the green peppers from my side of the pizza? I'm trying to do my best to lose fat!"

"Ah yeah, Tommy," Kouji added. "Can you put those green peppers on my side of the pizza then? I look like a freaking skeleton. I need to gain more muscle! I can't even qualify for Playgirl."

"Guys, let's not talk about what you have and what you don't have!" Izumi smiled. "I mean, we already saw you doofuses at strip poker. K?"

"Yeah! Besides, it looks like Takuya's DA man for you, Izumi!" the goggle-headed boy spoke up with a sparkle of delight. "Because all I've got after 'Agnimon' is my own name, T-A-K-U-Y-A! Has Destiny found the luckiest boy in the world or what?"

"Looks a LOT like it!" Izumi said, hugely impressed. She licked her lips too in anticipation. Whether that was over Takuya's win or the cooling double pepperoni pizza was left to the wonders of Kouji and Junpei.

"Oh man!" Junpei gathered together the remaining letters behind his little mount, and held the hands up to his cheeks, as if he had just borne witness to a disaster, which was basically what it was. These were the following….

UJKISXU

"Just my luck! I'm tall, cute and cuddly, and for some reason Izumi wants a boyfriend who can win Scrabble! I've got to arrange something! Gotta win the game before Takuya does! Wait….There is something coming from these words! It's my only chance!"

So after Zoe came up with "Blonde" and Kouji concocted "Bishonen", it was Junpei's ultimate gamble at hand. He had no sense in backing off from the chance. If I can't have Izumi….NO! I WILL have the chance! World, here I come! He interconnected all his blocks into where the "o" in "Bishonen" was laid. The following result was his idea of a grand finale.

K-O-U-J-I-S-U-X

"Ha Ha Ha! Ah ha ha ha ha! I've found the word! A whole word!" Junpei seemed to waltz under a sugar high, laughing maniacally. "I've won the game at last! Eat that, everyone!"

Takuya and Izumi stared down at what they saw on the board, and they silently scooted their seats from the site as Kouji came blowing through the roof with a completely unseen-of rage. The table of Scrabble was a shower of flying plastic pouring over the living room.

"Junpei! I'm gonna nail you for that!" Koji swore.

"Huh? EEEEk!" Junpei woke up from his insanity and yelped as Kouji came chasing after the big boy, both hands hooked in an impatient grappling position. The war was on as Kouji chased Junpei down the halllway. Minutes later, Kouji began running out the front door, heart pounding.

"Look out! Junpei's got a board with a nail!"

"Hah! Now I'll nail you for that evil remark!" Junpei had grabbed a floor panel from the hallway that bore a rusty nail.

"You're the one who made a mockery out of me. You deserved it!" Koji and Junpei both were out of the house.

Takuya and Izumi watched the fighting ensue, before Tommy walked out of his PS3 again and held up the pizza box. "Sorry, everybody, but, FFXXII kicked ass so much that, uh, I forgot to share the pizza with all of you. I'm afraid I only got one slice left."

"Well, not like anybody else is having that pizza," Takuya and Izumi both spoke in unison as they grabbed both ends of the slice. They stared long and soft at each other, their visions dipped in their serene orbs that carried their every vision, glistening and shimmering.

"Go on," Izumi spoke softly. "Take the pizza, Mr. Takuya."

"Uh, no, you take it, heh heh," Takuya pushed the pizza to her side. "It's delicious, just like you."

"But honestly, you should have it, you're gonna be hungry."

"No, I'm not gonna be hungry, so just take it with you."

"Get the pizza, damn it, or we're not gonna have a date!"

"Now what's that supposed to mean, we didn't even complete Scrabble!"

"You lunkhead, can't you see there's no use in completing it?!"

Takuya narrowed his eyes. "Then all my efforts got wasted and all I have to do is give you a damn pizza? Huh?!"

"Well, yeah, that's about it!" screeched Izumi.

"Then here you GO!" With maximum velocity, Takuya seized the pizza and splat the food into Izumi's facade. Tommy took it to earthquake safety measures and ducked beneath a mahogany table.

Izumi's mouth was wide open in shock, then her teeth clenched like chalk screeching over a chalkboard. "URRRRR! My $200 fashion statement, ruined! Takuya, you're really gonna pay!"

"Oops, my bad," Takuya ran pell-mell out the house and Izumi followed.

Tommy stood out of the table and saw the carnage his four friends were leaving behind. He darted a hand against a phone and dialed the numbers. "Uh, yeah, 9-1-1? My friends are all going crazy. Well, the fat kid and the skinny kid are fighting over a board with a nail, and this girl's throwing my best friend all over the place. The place?" Tommy, having forgotten the address, stared at the post outside the window. "Um, can't read the sign. Now the skinny kid's beating the fat kid with it."

THE LIVING END?

As you can see, I was bored as hell. Read and review, if you want...

A/N: I'm in the works of a website that will contain my other stuff. Anybody who knows about Takato being adopted by Janyuu will know who I really am.


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